


Out (at the ballgame)

by Aeshna etonensis (GMWWemyss)



Series: Englishmen (and an Irishman) Abroad: Five Men in the Same Boat. To Say Nothing of the Dog.... [3]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Baseball, Cricket, Culture Shock, Gen, Homesickness, Humour, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-26
Updated: 2013-06-26
Packaged: 2017-12-16 06:45:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/859077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GMWWemyss/pseuds/Aeshna%20etonensis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is reported in the popular press that two members of One Direction attended a baseball game in Baltimore whilst on tour in America. I could not possibly resist. (M must be thanked – although he’ll resent even being mentioned in this context – for having taught me a trifle about the American National Pastime – otherwise, ‘rounders’ – some three decades ago.)</p><p>It oughtn’t to be necessary that I say this is the merest fiction; and that its sole purpose is amusement, particularly to those of us belonging to the cricketing nations of the world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Out (at the ballgame)

‘Stand up,’ hissed Liam.

Zayn, grumbling, stood. They’d only just sat down. All ’round them, people were standing, mostly with their palms on the left sides of their chests, where the heart is conventionally thought to be. The Americans’ national anthem brassed and thumped.

When everyone else sat, they sat also. ‘Do they always do that?’

‘I think so.’

‘Humph. I’d like to see how it’d go if we played “The Queen” every time at Edgbaston or Headingley before a match.’

‘We’re in a different country, love.’

‘I’d noticed. Largely because they don’t speak English.’

‘Zayn –’

‘And worse, they think they _do._ Why is the bowler standing on a mound of earth?’

‘I’ve no idea. And before you ask, I don’t know where the other batsman is, why the wicketkeeper is crouched like that, what they mean by calling _that_ a “bat”, or where in fact the sodding wicket _is._ I think,’ said Liam, wisely, ‘we’re going to want lashings of beer.’

‘If you call this dishwater-weak lager, “beer”….’

 _Lovely,_ thought Liam. _Zayn was evidently going to be stroppy for the whole bleeding match._

‘What – Liam, _look._ ’ Liam by now had his tablet out, desperately trying to find a Guide to Baseball for the Perplexed Briton Abroad. ‘The bowler’s no run-up and – oi! Did you see that? That was _throwing,_ that was! The –’

‘Keep your voice down! This is the bowler’s home ground!’

‘But it was _throwing,_ Liam! Where’d he learn his trade? _India_? Bleeding _Lancs_?’

‘It says here,’ said Liam, forlornly, ‘that that’s what they’re _meant_ to do – oh, look, he’s bowling again.’

‘No, he’s _throwing_. Oh, my God, he’s at it _again –_ very fast-paced, this baseball.’ Zayn broke off to stare at the scoreboard. ‘Liam, why isn’t it showing a run? That was a wide!’

‘Love…. It says here it was a “ball”.’

‘Well, obviously: it wasn’t a _no_ -ball –’

‘They don’t have those – I think. Apparently, if a batsman’s ever bowled four wides, I mean “balls”, he gets to walk to first base. For having four, er, balls.’

‘Well, naturally he’d walk, he couldn’t very well _run,_ with four balls. Worse than Haz’ four nipples –’

‘ _Zayn_ –’

‘What in buggery – he’s _walking_. The batsman’s bloody leaving the crease. Given out? He _can’t’ve_ been dismissed, he hasn’t lost his wicket –’

‘Er. It says here that the, er, “strike zone” is like the wicket, like, an invisible wicket –’

Zayn snorted, at once scoffing and appalled.

‘And if the batsman fails to make contact and hit safely – I think that means without being caught – after three balls bowled in the “strike zone”, he’s lost his wicket.’

‘His _invisible_ wicket. These people are _mad._ No extras? _Madness._ Just as well they won their independence in whenever it was. This is utter sharn, this is – oh, the new bloke’s hit one for – never mind, he’s caught. Even _I_ can tell that. But what would you call that? Extra cover?’

Liam stifled a groan. ‘I _think_ … that’d be “right field”?’

‘They’re barking mad, these Americans. What’s this, now, the third ball bowled to this batsman? There were six bowled before he came on, that ought to have been the first over – look! He’s lbw! Why isn’t he being given out? Did the other XI not appeal? Where does the daft sod think he’s going?’

‘Ah. “First base”, I think? He’s been, er, “hit by pitch”, so –’

‘What does the bloody _pitch_ have to do with it? He’s left the crease, he _must_ have been given out lbw –’

Liam’s voice was beginning to break a little, with strain. ‘According to this, if the bowler’s delivery strikes the batsman –’

‘You said it was a “strike” when the batsman didn’t hit the ball –’

He was going to cry, honestly he was. He took – for now – a deep breath, staving off hysteria. ‘If a ball bowled by the bowler hits the batsman, the batsman is awarded first base. It says.’

‘ _Not_ out lbw? Madness. Utterly back to front. Hullo, the batsman’s driven one. That should be a single, Liam, why is there nothing on the scoreboard?’

‘He doesn’t get a run for it, love. He goes to first base, and the, er, “runner” – oh, bugger: the chap already at first – he, ah, advances to second.’

Zayn simply shook his head, despairing of the insanity of rounders. The next batsman faced four deliveries – which Zayn, in a _voce_ that was anything but _sotto,_ characterised as ‘dot ball, wide, let alone’ and ‘nice defensive cut’ … and which the baseball commentator described as ‘called strike, ball, called strike, foul’ (Liam didn’t even bother trying to retail the website’s explanation of ‘fouling a pitch off’: he could already feel a headache coming on); and then….

‘Now that’s better,’ said Zayn, in accents of satisfaction (as the Yanks muttered about a pitch in the dirt that never reached the plate). ‘A properly bowled inswinger.’

Liam swallowed. He was, regrettably, incapable of seeing his clear duty and _not_ doing it. ‘Actually,’ said he, wincing as he said it, ‘if the ball bowled makes contact with the pitch before reaching the batsman –’

‘No, don’t tell me,’ said Zayn, wearily. ‘The other side win. Then they get gongs in the next Honours List and Congressmen press them to marry their nubile young daughters. Also, they are given expensive things and allowed to vote twice in each general election.’

‘Well, no, but it’s a no-ball. I know I said they didn’t have those, but apparently they do, and that was one.’

Zayn gaped at him, his face overwritten in large letters reading _This is a piss-take, Liam Payne, surely it is._ Liam returned his usual gaze of helpless candour.

‘Flaming bloody Nora,’ whispered Zayn. ‘This is _madness._ Flipping _hell._ ’

They’d missed two deliveries, wrangling. The next, struck only to be caught, resulted in the retirement of both sides from the pitch. Wordlessly, Liam simply handed over his tablet so that Zayn could read for himself that that was the end of the innings. Well, _‘inning’,_ sans a terminal ‘s’.

Some weeks before, they’d given an interview – which had as yet, fortunately, to see the light of day – in which the reporter had valiantly tried to ask something they’d not been asked a hundred times before. Unfortunately, she’d begun with Louis – never a wise choice – in asking that they all describe their bandmates by what sort of sandwich they’d be (if, of course, they’d been sandwiches). Liam had been indifferent to being compared to roast beef, although The Tommo had (of _course_ ) managed to put a world of lascivious suggestion into the words ‘beef: thick but lean and tasty’, and had made several well-conceived _meat_ jokes; Zayn had been rather less happy to be categorised, offensively (Louis meant well and was wholly without prejudice, but, being Louis, he simply never _thought_ ), as a chicken shawarma sarnie. Where Louis had made his mistake, though, was in describing Harry as a ‘cheese – Cheshire, naturally – and pickle butty’ and Niall as ‘corned beef on soda bread’: for Louis had (typically) been affronted when in return Niall compared _him_ to a sandwich of overly-dramatic _ham,_ and Louis’ Very Own Hazza had suggested in his turn, rather sharply, that, were Louis a sandwich, he’d be marmite.

The gloom into which Louis had thus sunk from having incautiously invoked a nemesis – until, to the answering gloom of Niall, Liam, and Zayn, he and Harry had rather loudly Made Up Later That Night – had been, however, as nothing to the gloom that now hovered over Zayn like his own personal raincloud as Baltimore began to bat in their turn. McLouth struck out in five pitches (or so asserted the American commentator) and Machado was caught at – by Zayn’s estimate – mid-off, more or less; then Markakis came to the wicket. _Plate_. At any rate he took the crease.

On the third Cleveland delivery (bowler, Jimenez), the Baltimore batsman drove it straight to, well, straight, and Zayn was on his feet, gloom cast away, applauding: ‘A six! He’s hit it for six, oh, lovely, did you see that, and with that absurd excuse for a bat, too!’ When the scoreboard showed only one run, however, Liam simply gestured to his tablet, and Zayn sank back into his seat, arms folded, sitting practically on his spine, engaged in a truly strenuous pout.

And so it went. Liam was privately thankful that the sport was so fast-moving, and that in duration it was as brief as a T20 match. When Wieters hit a boundary (‘ _one_ run, Liam, I know. _Madness_ ’); when, thereafter, Baltimore conclusively lost the lead thus acquired to a succession of singles (cue lengthy explanations) in the ‘top of the sixth’ (further hopeless explanation) and a ‘two-run homer’ (Liam didn’t even try) off a Brantley boundary to long off: nothing penetrated Zayn’s heavily-worked disgust. _At least,_ Liam thought, before loyally suppressing the reflection, _had he brought Niall, the peanuts and “hot dogs” and the mysterious “cracker jack” had diverted Niall for more than the five minutes each for which these roused Zayn from his mutinous mood of roaring bolshevism._

Not even the ‘seventh-inning stretch’ and sing-along (accompanied by mutters regarding tea intervals and the Barmy Army) cheered Zayn. Having taken on board at last that the ninth innings – ‘all right, _inning,_ babe, I can’t be arsed to _care_ any longer’ – was the last, he made certain to have their security en route before the end of play. ‘And I am _not_ hanging about for the Man of the Match,’ said he, warningly.

Liam could only shrug. ‘Just as well. They don’t do _that,_ either.’

Zayn slumped in his seat, refusing to look at the pitch – _ballpark:_ what _ever_ – let alone at Liam.

Liam carefully suppressed a smile. He’d twigged by the third innings what was beneath this sudden access of uncharacteristic bloody-mindedness – for Zayn might be moody, but he was hardly ever _impolite_ – and knew a certain means of, if not fixing it, diverting it.

As they waited for their security detail, Liam, sedulously not looking at Zayn, chatted idly. ‘Funny, really. The innings: “top” and “bottom” and what not. And runs and scoring and that. And balls…. You know, if it’d been much _more_ alien, you’d’ve loved it. But it was just enough like cricket, only not, that it made you homesick.’

Zayn was silent, but Liam could _hear_ his blush as his breathing audibly hitched.

‘So naturally you threw a tanty, because, well: homesick. Even though, when we _are_ home, you don’t care two pins for cricket – although they’d run you out of Yorkshire, with Boycs leading the mob, if you ever admitted as much.’

When Zayn did speak, now, it was in a very small voice. ‘I ruined it for you, didn’t I. I’m meant to be a man grown, I’m an international star, if you believe the sharn they print about us … and I ruined your day out because I miss my mum. And dad. And _even_ my sisters. Slightly.’

‘Oh, love. I’ve just spent three hours and a quarter in your company. Without Haz running about naked, Louis loosing Armageddon without trying, and Niall inhaling anything and everything vaguely edible. And even when you’re being a little shit, you’re fitter than any of those chaps on the pitch – and even Cooky, Broady, and Jimmy. So. I’m perfectly happy.’ He grinned, still not looking at Zayn, but knowing, _feeling,_ as tactile as he’d feel the pressure of a hand on his jaw, that Zayn was looking enrapt at him. ‘And besides, you’re cute when you’re childish.’

‘When. When we get back. You can … you could, um, spank me? If you like?’ Zayn did penitence rather well, when cornered.

Liam managed – how, he never knew – to keep his grin in bounds and not to broadcast utter lust for a five-mile radius. ‘Oh, no: that’s no more a punishment for you than for me, love. You _like_ it too well when I do. No; we’ll go back to the hotel, we’ll read up on baseball and arrange to go to another, er, game when next we’ve time and there’s a match on wherever we are … and I’ll give you a hands-on demonstration of _top_ and _bottom_ innings, and _balls_.’

Zayn’s hand twined in his. Liam had – as he’d known he should do – won. And victory, like Zayn even when in a strop, was always, at the end of the day, sweet.


End file.
